Bob Dylan criticised for silence after Nobel Prize award

ANGUS HOWARTH

A member of the Swedish Academy that awarded the 2016 Nobel Prize in Literature to Bob Dylan says the singer-songwriter’s silence since receiving the honour is “impolite and arrogant”.

Per Wastberg said Dylan’s lack of reaction was predictable but disrespectful. He was quoted telling a Swedish newspaper yesterday: “One can say that it is impolite and arrogant. He is who he is.”

Wastberg said the academy still hopes to communicate with the 75-year-old, whose award credits him with creating “new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition”. The prize will be officially conferred on 10 December in Stockholm.